NATICK, Mass. – Providence Business News was named a “Distinguished Newspaper” by the New England Newspaper & Press Association for the second time in the last three years at the organization’s 2012 Fall Conference Thursday.

The award was given as part of the association’s annual New England Newspaper of the Year awards program and came in the Specialty Newspaper category for weekly newspapers (taking home first place in the category was The Catholic Transcript of Hartford).

PBN was also recognized in NENPA’s annual Better Newspaper Competition, where it was named one of the top three weekly newspapers in the region with circulation greater than 6,000 in three out of the last four years.

PBN was joined by a number of other newspapers in the region in being recognized by NENPA:

The Standard-Times of New Bedford – Newspaper of the Year in daily, weekday edition, circulation of 20,000 to 35,000.

The Herald News of Fall River – Distinguished Newspaper, weekday edition, circulation of 15,000 to 20,000

The Westerly Sun – Distinguished Newspaper, weekday edition, circulation of less than 8,000

The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro – Distinguished Newspaper, Sunday edition, circulation of less than 16,000

The Herald News also received a Publick Occurrences Award for Outstanding Journalism for its series “Autism Around Us.”

And finally, Michael Scully, an assistant professor of communication at Roger Williams University, was named the 2012 New England Journalism Educator of the Year for spearheading the creation of a journalism program at RWU. “Scully’s progressive outlook, enthusiasm and commitment serve as a model for journalism educators everywhere,” said the citation by NENPA.

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